October 23, 2011

In the weeks since the last 'Lesley Riddoch Podcast, a few things have happened. Amongst the names that will be referenced are Dr Liam Fox, Colonel Gaddafi, Robbie Savage and Russell Grant. Health will also come to the fore in a packed podcast.Lesley reveals what the Norwegians do at lunchtime and makes an interesting suggestion to the SNP government.

October 19, 2011

Between finishing scanning obscure Norwegian archives and preparation for next week's Nordic Horizon's event; there will be no podcast this week. I am sure there will still be the threat of an Icelandic eruption, more politicians misbehaving and other news worthy items when we come to record this weekend. So apologies, but we will be back very soon.

October 10, 2011

Just to say happy 150th birthday Fridtjof Nansen -- Norwegian explorer, humanitarian and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. He skied over Greenland in 1888 and travelled further north than anyone to test his theories about ocean currents on the Fram. His reappearance after being lost on the Polar Ice with a colleague for 1000 days became part of the surge in Norwegian self confidence that led to the country's emergence as a sovereign nation in 1905. Nansen then devoted himself to the League of Nations -- Nansen passports saved hundreds of thousands of displaced people after WW1 and won him the Peace Prize in 1922. I'm thinking of writing a column next Monday in the Scotsman suggesting Scotland should host a Year of the Forgotten Explorers Event next year to complement the emphasis there will naturally be on the Scott/Amundsen race which the Norwegian won on December 14th 1911. Exploring though wasn't all about races, flags and competition. Nansen proved that. So did the largely forgotten Orkney explorer John Rae who was vilified after reporting on the circumstances surrounding the gruesome death of British explorer Sir John Franklin. In the process Rae had discovered the final link in the notoriously elusive North West Passage in the Arctic, but Franklin was posthumously and erroneously knighted for the "discovery".

There's also the man who opened up much of Alaska John MacKenzie. Any takers?

October 04, 2011

Lesley has been hanging out with wildlife in Hammerfest and shares some of her insights into lemmings. Chris, on the other hand, is confused by 'curators' because he saw a documentary movie; Page One. He ponders aloud the future of print media.

October 03, 2011

Wangari Maathai who died last week was the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize. Her Green Belt Movement encourages people to plant trees – and challenges African leaders she has accused of betraying their people. This interview was published in Africawoman in 2005.

"When we got independence, leaders failed to see the lifestyle the colonial administrators were living was exploitative, undemocratic and brought conflicts. In many African countries we talk of the change of guards. But there was not a change of thinking. We changed guards and continued with the lifestyle. That lifestyle can only survive if you don't have democratic governance and if you don't share resources equitably. Quite often what happens is that those in power get in business with outsiders and benefit at the expense of the majority. It is only the African leaders who can change that. If they do not shift their consciousness, if they cannot see that that is intolerable for a few of them to live so comfortably and the rest of their people to live in such poverty -- then it is very difficult to ask outsiders to come and change that system for them.It's very important for citizens to understand that, even in Western democracies, those who were in power did not give that power freely. Citizens sometimes have to come to terms with the fact they cannot tolerate misgovernance. And they cannot be engaged in wars that never end.The developed countries know very well what Africa needs. There has been so much debate about it. We all know that their excuses have been corruption, misgovernance and money being used for weapons. Excuses, but to a certain extent legitimate. Nobody's going to pour money into a corrupt government - meant for development and then used for buying weapons. Nobody's going to pour money into a country impoverishing itself by destroying its environmental base. What would be the excuse if we really ensured resources go to the purposes for which they are intended? What would be their reason not to give, not to raise their contributions?It would be interesting! We would be talking about a different era altogether. We would be saying, "OK, what you give, it's used for what is intended. There is no corruption (in Africa) any more. There is no misgovernance." Then the developed countries would be challenged to meet their commitments.The African people have been so trusting of their leaders. So many of the leaders are like me. They have come to the West. They have studied in the West. We gained skills and knowledge and we were expected to go back and help our people. But many of us went back and took advantage of their confidence in us -- believing that we knew better than them. We were coming to deliver them! Well, we didn't. We took advantage of them and we used them. Because they trusted us, it took a long time for them to believe that we truly betrayed them. We now need to tell them we are sorry webetrayed them.Development to me is like an African stool with three legs. On those legs balances a basin. One of those three legs is peace. Another is good governance. And the other is good management of our resources. The basin that sits on the stool is development. It may be very small, it may be very wide but if it is not resting on the three legs it will collapse.Will the governments in the industrialized countries address these issues at the G8? I hope so. Will African governments address this challenge? If they do, then we will have changed the way we think. We will have reached a new level of consciousness. Reproduced with thanks to African Renewal published by the UN

How the GreenBelt Movement worksPlanting trees protects the environment, provides wood, stops soils erosion, and pays planters 2p per tree to buy equipment and start small businesses.700 trees pays for a beehive, a pottery or an oven to make cakes. The scheme combats HIV because women can earn a living without resorting to prostitution.The tree nurseries are used to teach people how to grow local crops – protection from world price changes in coffee or maize and a safety net for communities during bad harvests.Maathai, a professor of veterinary medicine at the University of Nairobi, started Green Belt by planting seven trees in her backyard in 1997. Since that time, an estimated 30 million have been planted by the movement in 30 countries across Africa. In Kenya alone, there are now some 6,000 GBM nurseries. The professor's grassroots movement was seen as a challenge to the authorities -- under the rule of former Kenyan president Daniel Arap Moi, she was arrested several times, and on the eve of her 60th birthday knocked unconscious by police while planting trees in Nairobi.

The W8 – from the Africawoman newspaper edited in July 2005 by Lucy Oriang in Nairobi and Lesley Riddoch in Newburgh

If the world leaders at Gleneagles want inspiring practical examples of what can be achieved against all odds, they will not hear it from one another. Or – probably -- from the African leaders to be shipped in under wraps halfway through their deliberations.The real change agents are absent from the official proceedings. As usual. That's why the women who could change Africa are present on our front page. The W8 are representative of the hundreds of women activists praised by leaders but rarely backed with big cash programmes. To demand thatthis changes is not special pleading for women. It's a special plea – this time -- to back the people who produce results.

Like Graca Machel. She married Nelson Mandela on his 80th birthday. Before that she lived in Mozambique, married to its President Samora Machel who was killed in a plane crash. She was the Minister of Education who persuaded the government to devote 12% of the national budget to education, a rare feat in Africa. Within five years she cut illiteracy by 22% and increased the school-going population from 400 000 to 1.6 million. Result.Like Nobel Peace Prize Winner Professor Wangari Maathai from Kenya. She started the Green Belt Movement planting seven trees in her garden in 1997. Since then 30 million trees have been planted – mostly by women - in 30 countries across Africa. Every tree earns the planter 2p. 700 trees pay for a beehive, a pottery or an oven. That's 43 thousand small businesses created by helping the environment. Result.Like Lornah Kiplagat – Kenya's superb long distance runner who had no support to become a world record holder but now ploughs her winnings back into her High Altitude Training Centre. Her New York marathon winning colleague Tecla Lorupe from Kenya founded the Peace Run movement to unite communities in conflict. Tecla's peace run began with 150 warriors from the Pokot and Arakwet communities in Kenya -- this month she runs to war-torn southern Sudan.

Like Hauwa Ibrahim, the first female lawyer in her part of Northern Nigeria who secured the release of Amina Lawal, sentenced to death by stoning for adultery by a Sharia court in 2003. Hauwa has worked pro bono on 10 similar cases with sentences of stoning or flogging and several cases of boys sentenced to amputation for stealing. No woman has yet lost her life. Result.

Like Alivera Kiiza who leads a coffee co-operative in Tanzania – women make up 80% of African farmers but less than 8% of farmers leaders. Inspired by a Cafédirect funded trip to London – she was the first woman from her community to ever leave Tanzania – Alivera encourages women to joinco-ops in their names not their husbands and to become co-op leaders.Winnie Byanyima, a former MP and wife of the exiled opposition leader in Uganda intends to stand as a candidate for the Presidency next year. Now working for the African Union, she has faced harassment and threats, and understands other women may feel unable to support her.But still she dares to try.

To update Winnie's story, President Yoweri Museveni won the 2011 elections after allegations of voterigging -- even after Wikileaks revealed massive corruption and cynical manipulation of the constitution to remove the limits to his term in office; kickbacks surrounding Uganda's oil exploration contracts; rumoured moves to place Museveni's son, Lt. Col. Muhoozi Kainerugaba, in line of succession. At the last count, national inflation was at 21.4 per cent.

Like Anna Tibaijuka -- head of the UN Habitat Agency who used her position as an Africa Commissioner to warn the world about the flight to cities created by starvation and crop failure in the African countryside. She is now Now Minister for Lands, Housing and Human Settlements in Tanzania – and has tried to tackle the multi-national land grabs highlighted by Oxfam last week.

And our own Africawoman writer Grace Githigia -- the new President of AMARC, the World Association of Community Broadcasters. While state radio is often "monitored" by government, AMARC has backed local people to set up more than a 100 stations reaching a possible 250 million listeners. A fantastic resource in a continent where 70% of women and 50% of men are illiterate.If money is ever to follow merit, the G8 could break from tradition, read the evidence in this paper and spend the equivalent of their drinks budget on a committee composed of these women. Then use their recommendations as a guide for spending at least half the enlarged aid budgetThere is an old African saying; Heal a woman – you heal a village. It's time the world let women heal Africa.